Sophie Charara from pcauthority.com.au listed GTA III as one of the 25 best PlayStation games.

Grand Theft Auto III (2001)

Yes, it eventually turned up on the PC and Xbox, but for the first year or so, Grand Theft Auto III on the PlayStation 2 was the only game in town. It astonished us with its huge open world, wicked sense of humour and the detailed 3D graphics that made Liberty City a character in its own right. Later GTA games may have built on its success, but Grand Theft Auto III was the quantum leap for the series and an indicator of just what the PS2 was capable of.

With stellar voice acting, a darkly comic storyline, a stunning soundtrack and revolutionary open-world gameplay, Grand Theft Auto III was a landmark moment in popular culture.

The tale of a small-time criminal set loose in Liberty City, a sprawling metropolis where anything could happen, Grand Theft Auto III was the frontrunner of a new genre: the non-linear, 'open world' 3D game. It also marked a turning point in the evolution of videogames into a bonafide entertainment phenomenon.

10 years ago, this month, the revolutionary open-world epic Grand Theft Auto III was released to the world – a game that set players loose as a small-time criminal at the bottom of the food chain in Liberty City, a sprawling metropolis where anything can happen – and probably will.

To commemorate the game’s 10th anniversary, we’re proud to announce that Grand Theft Auto III will be coming to select new generation iOS and Android devices later this fall. For the lineup of devices currently confirmed to be supported at launch, check the list below and stay tuned for more devices to be announced:

Any feedback is more than appreciated! I worked on this for 1.5 years, and put hundreds of hours of work and my heart and soul into this, and I hope that comes across to anyone who plays the world, and hope you like it just as much as I do. =] Thank you

GTA III, Vice City and San Andreas have finally been ported to Mac. Of course the true GTA trilogy would be GTA1, GTA London and GTA2. I'd love to see Rockstar Games dust off and revive that classic code.

MVC have posted an interview with Sam Houser, the co-founder and Executive Producer on the GTA games.

Houser says that surviving in an environment in which large numbers of powerful people want to put you out of business for their own political or economic capital has been the biggest challenge of his career.

Rockstar recently held a GTAIV multiplayer event at the Microsoft offices in Sydney and were very keen to show off their modes for GTAIV Multiplayer, so let’s get into it.

There were only six or eight of us nosey nerds at the event that day. We each sat down to our own Xbox 360 which were linked via Xbox Live to each other. At first I thought we were connected locally which goes to show how well the net code of GTAIV stood up.

2007-10-12 - GTA IV multiplayer - 16 players
"Rockstar's man on the scene told GamingExcellence that they had begun testing the various plots and that the developers were considering the possibility of having an open world completely unlocked from the start of the game. We also understand that the game's multiplayer mode, unseen in the GTA franchise since GTA2 in 1999*, is aiming for at least 16 simultaneous players, with more than just the usual deathmatch mode."
Source: gamingexcellence.com

2007-10-06 - Rockstar not happy with Simpsons game content
Normally, it's Rockstar that has to deal with complaints about their game content but in this case, Rockstar is doing the complaining. Apparently they have demanded that content parodying GTA be removed from EA's new Simpsons game. It is likely that Rockstar's lawyers are just trying to protect their property but it still seems like a very hypocritical move, considering that all of Rockstar's GTA games contain many parodies of movies and even some games.
Link: kotaku.com

2007-08-31 - SA-MP v0.2.2 R2 client released
"Due to some bugs/crashes/problems that were not found during beta testing of 0.2.2, we're releasing the 0.2.2 R2 client. Please update to this version. This is a client only update. The 0.2.2 server does not need to be updated.

This update fixes the following issues:

Some crashes related to models/pickups.

Collision processing issues (may fall through the ground).

Chat window wrapping server messages.

Texture rendering if your graphics card uses a custom d3dx9_25.dll.

There may be another 0.2.2 bugfix release before we start work on SA-MP 0.3."
Link: sa-mp.com

2007-08-30 - SA-MP v0.2.2 released
San Andreas Multiplayer v0.2.2 has been released. It includes the following changes:

2007-08-24 - GTA2 multiplayer map - Block FortBlock_Fort.zip - 67KB (6 players) - "Loosely based off the Mario Kart 64 arena of the same name. This map has a team mode with up to three players per team. The smaller version is idea for a frantic match of tag, since it is symmetrical. The larger version provides a more traditional gta2 experience, complimenting the small arena with an outer ring of weapons and car equipment shops. The full version differs from the teams version only in having 4 tanks. The team version has 3 race cars at each base in place of the tanks." - Wario5

2007-08-03 - GTA IV delayed
Sadly, GTA IV release date has been delayed from October 2007 to fiscal 2008 (sometime in Feb, March or April) due to additional development time required to complete the title.Take2 press release

2007-07-14 - We Know The Truth
If you are over 18 and can call a US phone number, you have a chance to get your voice on the radio of GTA IV or a future Rockstar game. Check the links below for more information.WKTTRADIO.comyoutube.com WKTTRADIO message recording (thanks to Jordon from planetgta.com)

2007-07-12 - GTA IV multiplayer
A short comment on GTA IV multiplayer was posted in an xbox.com news article.
"In addition to the exclusive content for Xbox 360, GTA IV will feature a multiplayer mode on Xbox LIVE that will match the drama and intensity of Niko's solo mission."

2007-06-29 - GTA IV trailer "Looking for that special someone"
The 2nd GTA IV trailer is up on yahoo.com, rockstargames.com and even XBOX 360 Media Marketplace.

2007-06-24 - SA-MP v0.2.1 released
"Due to some crashes in the SA-MP server and some minor bugs with the in-game weather, we have decided to release SA-MP server and client version 0.2.1." Link: sa-mp.com

2007-06-21 - SA-MP v0.2 released
This is a multiplayer mod for the PC version of San Andreas. This version includes:
"Tanks, sniper rifles, trains, trams, gang zones, bug fixes and more..."
Links: gtanet.comsa-mp.com

2007-05-12 - GTA2 Game Hunter v1.4821 (compulsory update)
You must update to this version. Old versions will no longer work. I don't normally force updates but I've been allowing old versions to connect for a long time and it's just much easier to support if everyone is using the latest and greatest. If you preferred another version or have a problem with this version then contact me.

Added country flag images in the country columns

Country name is displayed as a tooltip when you move the mouse over flag in the CC column

Added an arrow image to show which column is being used to sort and which direction the sort is going

Sort preferences are saved

/nick works again

IRC password is now displayed as asterisks. It's still saved in the registry as plain text.

Fixed Overflow 330 message when staying connected to GH for a long time

Changed "Your game lasted for" message colour to purple

Fixed the tab indexes on the settings screen

Removed frosties.de.eu.gtanet.com and replaced it with letterbox.nl.eu.gtanet.com

2007-05-10 - GTA2 maps: Wario Town and Suburban Anarchy
Wario5 updated Wario Town to work with the current version of Game Hunter and he made a new map with bots, called Suburban Anarchy.
Download from the GTA2 map page

2007-05-09 - GTA2: Endgame
DON_AWI, Cuban Pete, Bit and others are creating a short movie using the GTA2 engine. They want ideas for a story and any help they can get. Read this GTA2.info forum post for more information.

2007-05-01 - Grand Theft Arlen
Fox recently aired an episode of "King of the Hill" titled "Grand Theft Arlen". It featured a Grand Theft Auto style game called "Pro-Pain". I've never been a fan of King of the Hill and I can't believe it lasted this long but for gamers and GTA fans, this episode is actually worth checking out.
A detailed description of the episode can be found at pressthebuttons.com

Switched from vbalEdit.ocx to the standard RichTextBox control (this should make GH compatible with Windows Vista but it has not been tested)

When trying to join a game, GH was sending the comment from the most recently hosted game to mpaddon. This would show the wrong comment if the game you tried to join was not the most recently hosted game. It now uses the comment from the game you tried to join.

When you click on a name in the player list, the player list is disabled and focus is given to the chat window. The player list is enabled again as soon as you you type a character but the chat Window will keep the focus.

A space was added to the end of "/msg " (the command automatically filled in after you send a private message)

/wii is now an alias for /whois

If you try to join a Hamachi game, there were sometimes multiple popups saying click OK. Hopefully that's gone now but it's not fully tested.

Possibly fixed "processing error: Index out of bounds - Line: 3190" when trying to join a password protected game that was removed during join

Added some new bugs

Bug: Now it displays "Error while trying to join: Index out of bounds - Line: 50"

Bug: Broke the hyperlinks in the topic. They still work in the chat history. It will be fixed.

Bug: Windows 98 doesn't add carriage returns to the end of lines in this version.

2007-03-02 - Countdown to GTA IV trailerRockstar Games site has been updated with a counter to the release of the first Grand Theft Auto IV trailer. The trailer will be released on the 29th of March.

2007-02-19 - GTA2 Game Hunter v1.479

mpaddon update by JernejL - Now works if your GTA2 language is not set to English (should no longer shrink your GTA2 window)

Pinging each user who joins or hosts is now optional

Games will now be added to the list even if GH is unable to resolve the IP

Fixed "Error while trying to join: Index out of bounds - Line: 60", error with trying to join a game at the same time the host quit

Possibly fixed "processing error: Index out of bounds - Line: 3170", error with joining password protected games that had no version number

"Click OK when Hamachi has finished loading and logging." changed to "Click OK when Hamachi has finished loading and logging in."

Added a Settings button (I'll change to a toolbar eventually)

2007-02-17 - Open GTA status update
"No new features, in fact several things are still broken; yet the much needed rewrite of some classes is nearly complete. I see little reason of a full release at this time; however, the cvs is (for once) nearly identical to my latest version." - ZeroXPOpen GTA

2007-02-14 - GTA2 Game Hunter v1.4781 problems
Some of your Windows may shrink to a tiny size if your GTA2 language is not set to English and you have "Enhance GTA2 network screen" option enabled. I recommend you set your GTA2 language to English or untick "Enhance GTA2 network screen" in the settings. I will try to fix it in the next version.

2007-02-10 - GTA2 Game Hunter v1.4781

Fixed a major bug that prevented users from hosting if they had less than 95 MMP files and data\tempMMP folder didn't exist

Typing /wi or /whois without a name will no longer trigger an "Invalid procedure call or argument"

If you are using the enhanced GTA2 network screen, alt + c will no longer be sent. The button is pushed using a more reliable method.

2007-02-06 - GTA2 Game Hunter v1.477

The GTA2 network screen has received a face lift (Thanks to JernejL)

If a host had not selected a country and their hostname ended in .com, .net or .org, then two characters would be missing from the MMP name. This prevented people from joining their game. Joiners would receive a message saying they didn't have the map since it was looking for a map with two letters missing.

Maximum game comment length increased from 20 to 60 characters

You can try to join a game by clicking anywhere on the row (FullRowSelect). Previously you had to click in the Game column.

The map list is scrolled to the previously selected map (EnsureVisible)

Map selection screen is resizable, full row selectable and grid line enabled

If you have less than 100 MMP files then your custom MMPs will no longer be moved.

IRC name is displayed in titlebar instead of a label.

The message "If it is your nick, type /msg NickServ IDENTIFY password" is now hidden. You don't need to type that command, it is sent automatically.

GTA2 can now be launched from a network path (UNC path). Previously it had to be installed on a local drive.

2007-01-15 - Open GTA
ZeroXP is creating an open source GTA engine: Open GTA. It's not a playable game yet but he has been working on it for a while. Currently it can open the GTA1 map and graphics files and allows you to scroll around the city. There is a preview available for Windows and Linux. It should be fairly easy to port to other systems, provided they have the required libs.

2006-01-22 The server for MTA:SA has been released and according to their site , the client will be released tomorrow.

2006-01-19 The fix in 1.459 that made the game removed from list message only appear once, actually stopped games hosted with routers from being removed. So here is 1.4592 to fix it. GTA2 Game Hunter v1.4592 beta 251KB

Hosted games can now be password protected

Sound alerts can now be played if your name is mentioned or you receive a private message

Previously you had to wait for a sound to end before you could type, now sounds are played asynchronously so there is no delay.

"game has been removed from the list" will only be displayed once instead of twice

The create game button in GH is now disabled when you join a game

Removed CRC code since it wasn't actually used for anything

If GH pinged someone at the same time you were changing the ping value in the settings an error was displayed

Removed the extra slash from "You have more than 100 .mmp files in \\data folder"

If your name was in use and the name GTA2Guy was in use, sometimes GH could get stuck in a loop asking you for a new name. It no longer asks for a new name and just gives you a random name.

Games with a host address larger than 50 characters were previously unjoinable. One too many nulls was being written to "UseConnectiond" registry key. This prevented GTA2 network screen from appearing when trying to join those games. It was a rare event. One ISP that I noticed trigger this problem had a host address like this "CPE000c00000000-CM00000000a000.cpe.net.cable.rogers.com".

2006-01-17GTAT SA 0.3c has been released. "Here again an important update to make server and of course the client much more stable. The net code has been modified to be faster and more secure now." "I put also a small script with carshop in, but we still need help with our big community script."

2006-01-10 If you have a Polish, Russian or any version of GTA2 that has different text on the GTA2 network screen, please tell me what the text says.

These are the ones that I know "Network GTA2, GTA2 en réseau, Netzwerk GTA2, GTA2 en red, Rete GTA2". gtaT 0.3b has been released. It's a multiplayer mod for SA and this version has fully rewritten netcode and should be more stable. The server has been updated to v0.3b.2 and is now much faster.